Sunday, December 23, 2012

How Much Did Sheldon Adelson Really Spend on Campaign 2012?

Original Link: http://www.propublica.org/article/how-much-did-sheldon-adelson-really-spend-on-campaign-2012

By Theodoric Meyer

Sheldon Adelson, the billionaire casino magnate and emblem of the Citizens United-era of campaign finance, spent gobs of money on the 2012 elections — more money than anyone else in American history.
Exactly how much, you ask?

We don't really know, and it's likely we never will. Many of the groups that spent the most on the election aren't required to report their donors. But thanks to recent campaign finance filings, we can get a better idea.

We dug through Federal Election Commission and Internal Revenue Service records and found that Adelson and his wife, Miriam, spent at least $98 million this election cycle. The money went to at least 34 different candidates and groups, with contributions ranging from $2,000 for a Florida congressional candidate to $30 million for Restore Our Future, the super PAC that supported Mitt Romney.

Adelson also gave $20 million to Winning Our Future, a super PAC backing Newt Gingrich; $23 million to American Crossroads, a conservative super PAC; and $5 million each to the Congressional Leadership Fund and the YG Action Fund, both of which supported Republican candidates for Congress.

One of the more puzzling contributions was a $1 million check Adelson wrote in October. The money went to Hardworking Americans, a super PAC that attacked Sen. Debbie Stabenow, a Michigan Democrat who had a big lead in the polls and was re-elected three weeks later by a 21-point margin.

A spokesman for Adelson's company, Las Vegas Sands, did not respond to a request for comment.

The $98 million figure matches up with the $100 million that Adelson, who is worth a reported $21 billion, had vowed to spend to defeat President Obama. But it doesn't include the checks he wrote to "dark-money" groups — organizations that don't have to disclose their donors, making their spending harder to track. These groups have proliferated since the Supreme Court's 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, which opened the door to unlimited corporate and union giving.

The Huffington Post recently reported that Adelson's total spending may have approached $150 million.
Two anonymous Republican fundraisers told the Huffington Post that Adelson had given between $30 and $40 million to Crossroads GPS, the dark-money group founded by Karl Rove, and at least $15 million to groups affiliated with Charles and David Koch, the billionaire industrialist brothers. Adelson also gave millions to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Republican Jewish Coalition, the fundraisers said.

If accurate, those numbers would place Adelson's total spending on the election at around $155 million.

Correction: The original version of this story overstated the amount of Sheldon and Miriam Adelson's election spending that can be tracked through public records. It is at least $98 million, not $101 million. The original story did not take into account a $5 million donation to the super PAC Winning Our Future that was refunded Miriam Adelson, which lowered their total spending, as well as several state-level contributions.

Adelson gave $40 million to super PACs in final weeks of election

Original Link: http://www.publicintegrity.org/2012/12/21/11950/adelson-gave-40-million-super-pacs-final-weeks-election

By

Top 25 donors supplied more than a third of super PAC cash

Billionaire casino magnate Sheldon Adelson and family poured nearly $40 million into the coffers of GOP-aligned super PACs In the final three weeks of the 2012 campaign, bringing their total giving to the groups to more than $93 million.

Adelson ranks as the top donor to the outside spending groups by a wide margin, according to a Center for Public Integrity analysis of campaign finance records.

Super PACs raised roughly $830 million in the 2012 election, with conservative groups accounting for about 60 percent of the total, according to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics.

By contrast, President Barack Obama’s presidential campaign raised nearly $720 million and Republican challenger Mitt Romney’s raised almost $450 million, according to Federal Election Commission filings.
In all, the top 25 super PAC super donors doled out more than $310 million, about 37 percent of all super PAC receipts, according to the Center’s analysis of data from the FEC and Center for Responsive Politics. Ninety-one individuals gave at least $1 million to super PACs and collectively donated more than $330 million, according to the analysis.

The unlimited donations, which are used primarily to fund candidate attack ads, concern advocates such as Stephen Spaulding, staff counsel at Common Cause.

“People are able to distort the political process, open doors and be kingmakers simply because of the size of their bank account,” he said. “The threat of the spending just hangs over all the political decisions that are happening on [Capitol] Hill.”

After focusing primarily on the presidential contest, in the final weeks of the campaign, Adelson ramped up his giving to GOP-aligned super PACs active in House and Senate races.

In Virginia alone, Adelson invested $4 million into a super PAC that ran attack ads against Democrat Tim Kaine in the final days of the election.

His million-dollar contribution to a super PAC called the “Hardworking Americans Committee” accounted for the bulk of the money used in an unsuccessful last-ditch effort to defeat incumbent Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich.

And a GOP-aligned super PAC known as the “America 360 Committee” received $500,000 from the Adelsons as it touted incumbent Sen. Scott Brown, R-Mass., and criticized Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren in telephone calls and mailings.

Despite the spending, however, Democrats prevailed in the most contentious races — including battles for U.S. Senate seats in Massachusetts and Virginia.

Adelson’s donations to super PACs — which can accept unlimited donations from individuals, corporations and unions — set a new standard in political giving.

Texas businessman Harold Simmons, the billionaire owner of Contran Corp., ranked a distant second among super donors, giving $30.9 million, including donations from his company and wife, Annette Simmons.
One of Simmons' business ventures includes a site in West Texas built to store nuclear waste. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is currently debating rules that could result in sizeable contracts for Simmons' company.

Another Texan, millionaire Bob Perry, ranked third, giving $23.5 million to conservative super PACs. Perry is the owner of Perry Homes and an advocate for the business-led effort to limit damages awarded in lawsuits.

Millionaires and billionaires pepper the Center’s list of the top 25 super donors. The list also includes seven unions and the Republican Governors Association, a so-called “527 committee” that used a super PAC to direct funds into state races. None of these donors broke the $20 million mark.

Billionaire New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, No. 9, was a new addition to the list. Bloomberg gave more than $10 million to a group he launched called Independence USA PAC, whose priorities include stronger gun control laws and marriage equality for same-sex couples.

Other new additions to the Center’s list of top donors include:
Rose’s companies — Specialty Investments Group, Inc., and Kingston Pike Development, LLC— both list their address as Rose’s $634,000 private home outside of Knoxville, Tenn. Both were registered with the state of Tennessee in late September, and neither have websites.

Rose, after intense press scrutiny, went public saying Specialty’s mission is to "buy, sell, develop and invest in a variety of real estate ventures and investments." Rose released a lengthy press release, but did not indicate where the money for the donations originated.

Rose did not respond to requests for comment for this story.

The top Democratic-aligned super donor was Chicago media mogul Fred Eychaner, who gave $14.1 million over the course of the election cycle, split among five groups. That sum earned him the No. 4 spot on the Center’s top 25 list.

The pro-Obama Priorities USA Action super PAC collected $4.5 million from Eychaner, ranking as his top beneficiary. He also backed Majority PAC, House Majority PAC, Women Vote!, the super PAC of abortion rights advocacy group EMILY’s List, and America Votes Action Fund, a super PAC that funded get-out-the-vote efforts.

Liberal billionaire hedge fund manager George Soros* made it on the list, donating about $2.8 million split among four Democratic groups. His children Andrea, Alexander and Jonathan also each donated six-figure sums to Democratic super PACs, as did his daughter-in-law Melissa, bringing the family’s total giving to $5.1 million, enough to rank 18th.

Soros' children collectively gave $1.1 million to the pro-campaign finance reform super PAC "Friends of Democracy," which was launched by Jonathan Soros.

This is a far cry from the $23.7 million Soros donated during the 2004 election to 527 groups — the predecessors of super PACs — when he ranked as the top 527 committee financier, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.

Despite fears to the contrary, donations from blue-chip corporations were rare, although a month before the election, Chevron, the third-largest American company according to Forbes, donated $2.5 million to a Republican super PAC closely allied with House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio.

One of the largest, high-profile corporate donors was Weaver Holdings, the parent company of the Indiana-popcorn company known for its brands “Pop Weaver” and “Trail’s End,” which is sold by Boy Scouts across the country. Weaver Holdings, along with Weaver Popcorn, donated $3.4 million to American Crossroads, including $1 million during the final three weeks of the election.

American Crossroads was co-founded by GOP strategists Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie.

Unlike traditional political action committees, there is no limit on contributions to super PACs. They emerged following the U.S. Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision and a federal court ruling called SpeechNow.org v. Federal Election Commission.

Adelson is a staunch ally of Israel and an opponent of unions. He first hit the news when he and his relatives pumped more than $16 million into a super PAC that supported former GOP House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s failed bid for the Republican nomination for president.

He and his wife Miriam gave $30 million to the pro-Romney super PAC Restore Our Future, which accounted for nearly 20 percent of the nearly $154 million raised by the group.

In late October, the Adelsons also gave $23 million to American Crossroads, their first donations to the group. Crossroads spent more than $90 million in an unsuccessful effort to help Romney oust Obama.
Roughly two-thirds of Adelson’s $93 million went to super PACs that backed just one or two specific candidates. None of Adelson’s preferred candidates prevailed in any of the 10 races in which these super PACs were active.

Earlier this month, a defiant Adelson told the Wall Street Journal that he would spend even more money in future elections.

"I happen to be in a unique business where winning and losing is the basis of the entire business," Adelson told the newspaper. "I don't cry when I lose. There's always a new hand coming up."

Rank Name Total Given Ideology
1 Sheldon Adelson & family (see profile) $93.3 million Republican
2 Harold Simmons & wife, companies (see profile) $30.9 million Republican
3 Bob Perry (see profile) $23.5 million Republican
4 Fred Eychaner (see profile) $14.1 million Democratic
5 Joe Ricketts (see profile) $13.1 million Republican
6 William S. Rose (Specialty Group) (see profile) $12.1 million Republican
7 United Auto Workers (see profile) $11.8 million Democratic
8 National Education Association (see profile) $10.8 million Democratic
9 Michael Bloomberg (see profile) $10 million Independent
10 Republican Governors Association (see profile) $9.8 million Republican
11 James H. Simons (see profile) $9.6 million Democratic
12 AFSCME (see profile) $8.2 million Democratic
13 AFL-CIO (see profile) $7.4 million Democratic
14 Robert B. Rowling (see profile) $6.1 million Republican
15 American Federation of Teachers (see profile) $5.8 million Democratic
16 Robert Mercer (see profile) $5.5 million Republican
17 Steve and Amber Mostyn (see profile) $5.2 million Democratic
18 George Soros* & family (see profile) $5.1 million Democratic
19 William Koch (see profile) $4.8 million Republican
20 Peter Thiel (see profile) $4.7 million Republican
21 SEIU (see profile) $4.4 million Democratic
21 Joe Craft (see profile) $4.4 million Republican
23 John Childs (see profile) $4.2 million Republican
23 Plumbers and Pipefitters Union (see profile) $4.2 million Democratic
25 Jerry Perenchio (see profile) $4.1 million Republican

*George Soros is the chairman of the Open Society Foundation, which provides funding for the Center for Public Integrity. See a list of the Center's donors.

Source/Methodology: Center for Responsive Politics and Center for Public Integrity analysis of Federal Election Commission records. Totals include contributions from individuals, family members and corporations that are controlled by the individual super donor. Totals reflect donations made during the 2011-2012 election cycle, through Nov. 26.

ALEC's So-Called "Right to Work" Bill as Political Revenge in Michigan

Original Link: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/12/11902/alecs-so-called-right-work-bill-political-revenge-michigan

By Lisa Graves

As concerned workers come together across Michigan in protest, partisan politicians are poised to make one of the strongholds for America's blue-collar worker rights into a so-called "Right to Work" (RTW) state -- in accordance with the ALEC blueprint to change to state laws at the behest of some of the biggest corporations in the world. Yet, 42 corporations, including General Motors, have distanced themselves from ALEC this year after ALEC's role in controversial and divisive legislation was exposed.

RTW -- Brought Home to You by ALEC (and the Kochs, of course)

At issue is a bill spearheaded by ALEC legislators so beholden to their corporate benefactors that they think it's legitimate to vote in secret as equals with corporate lobbyists on model bills like RTW through ALEC "task forces," as the Center for Media and Democracy's PRWatch/ALECexposed has previously reported. Key provisions of the Michigan RTW bills (for instance, HB 4054) are taken almost verbatim from the ALEC template.
That agenda is part of a corporate wish list of Charles and David Koch, the oil billionaires who have spent millions trying to popularize extremist ideas and move them from the fringes into binding law. David Koch's group of political operatives known as "Americans for Prosperity" (AFP) -- which I call "Americans for Greed" -- is backing the divisive legislation in Michigan.

RTW -- Brought to You by Vengeful Partisans and Very Lame Ducks

But the bill rushed through the statehouse for the governor to sign is also poisonous political payback in a state where President Barack Obama beat Mitt Romney by almost 10% of the vote (nearly half a million votes), despite millions spent by the Kochs and other billionaires in campaign donations as well as dark money operations to get Romney in the White House and to get laws changes to their liking.
Michigan was a landslide loss for Republicans, who also lost seats in the state legislature in Lansing, a loss which will take effect when the next class of legislators is sworn in this January.
The get-out-the-vote (GOTV) effort in Michigan was built on workers banding together to knock on doors, make phone calls, and get people to the polls on election day. Volunteers from organized labor unions were not the only ones working to get people to vote. AFP and others backing Republicans knocked on doors too, and Romney won the vote of 50,000 more Michiganians than John McCain did in 2008, but fell far short of winning the state's 16 electoral votes.
When the dust settled from last month's election, a vindictive and diminished majority in the state legislature decided to push through a bill to weaken not just American workers' power to negotiate effectively with corporate managers but also to weaken organized workers as a political force at the ballot box.
It's a sour, petty, reprehensible maneuver.
It's especially arrogant to push it through at the last minute of a "lame duck" legislature whose authority is about to expire, and it is especially deceptive to do so after Governor Rick Snyder assured voters he would not pursue RTW in the state.

RTW -- Whose Prosperity? The Kochs ....

It's also a calculated move that demonstrates a palpable disdain for the will of the people in a state whose prosperity was built on private sector manufacturing jobs, with wages and benefits negotiated by labor unions. Those were good paying jobs that gave hard-working families financial security and a real chance to achieve the American dream and help their children have opportunities to be better off than their parents started off.
But those were the glory days before David Koch's prior group of operatives, dubbed "Citizens for a Sound Economy" (CSE) and his allies at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, started pushing hard in the 1980s for trade agreements that forced American workers to compete with third world wages and that shipped jobs overseas. And, it was before Koch's CSE launched the inside-the-beltway push in D.C. in the late 1980s to repeal the Depression Era Glass-Steagall protections against banks speculating in the stock market, a repeal that made the Wall Street stock market crash of 2008 possible, if not inevitable. (Koch Industries also lobbied against the modest Dodd-Frank reforms of derivatives trading in the 2009-2010 congressional session.)
IFG Koch Cash Chart(source: International Forum on Globalization)
Koch-backed ideas like these -- along with passing RTW, privatizing Social Security, thwarting efforts to address climate change -- have been very good for the Kochs. Some have already benefitted the Kochs' operations, including their speculation on oil prices and trading of oil derivatives. Such investments have helped make these two billionaires even richer. Since the Wall Street meltdown began in 2008, "the Kochs have exponentially increased their wealth by 58% while median family net worth dropped 40%," according to the research of the International Forum on Globalization.

RTW -- Less Pay, More Job Insecurity

But, such policies are very bad for ordinary Americans.

Wages for workers are lower in RTW states.

People who work in states that have bought the economic snake oil, like RTW, sold by the Koch-fueled hucksters from ALEC, along with their buddies at stink tanks like the Mackinac Center, make less than Americans in states that have not embraced this backward thinking.
It should come as no surprise that when private sector unions are weakened that this weakens the negotiating power of unions and also weakens the competitive wages offered by companies that are not unionized.

RTW is like a receding tide that lowers all boats.

Almost 75 years ago, Congress passed the National Labor Relations Act (NLRA) to help protect American workers' rights to organize and negotiate the terms of employment with corporations, helping to level the playing field between powerful corporations and individual workers with little leverage to get better wages, benefits, and working conditions. The NLRA specifically authorized the contracts collectively negotiated by labor unions to require all workers benefitting from the contract to pay dues to the union that negotiated the contract, a fair procedure called a "union security agreement" that helps protect against freeloading and also keep a union's power to enforce the contract strong.

RTW -- Bringing Some of the Worst of the South to the Northern Refuge

RTW versus Romney StatesBut in 1947, Congress under pressure from corporations amended that law to allow states to opt out of those procedures through what proponents call RTW laws. Other than the heart of the old confederacy -- which enacted RTW laws in the same period that states were trying to suppress the civil rights movement, which included many unions acting in solidarity -- most of the states in the country have not adopted RTW.

In fact, only three states have passed RTW in the past 25 years (Idaho in 1995, Oklahoma in 2001, and Indiana in 2012); the 20 other states that passed such legislation largely make up the deep south and a red swath west of the Mississippi. The 2012 presidential election map of "red" states looks strikingly close to the RTW map.
But the vast majority of blue states, like Michigan, have not embraced the long-standing ALEC agenda item of RTW. And, Oklahoma's experience over the past decade since the law passed has not been a poster child for higher wages and economic security for families.

RTW -- Scrooge, but What Will Christmas Future Bring?

It seems that whomever got to Governor Snyder and convinced him to suddenly help ram RTW through is more interested in turning Michigan red than in making sure Michigan workers have a better shot at better wages, a strong wage base that would be spent in local communities and thus help to rebuild the state's economy.

But, this political calculation could backfire at the ballot box because workers in Michigan were not voting this November or Novembers past for policies that result in even lower pay and fewer protections for the health and financial future of their families.

Repealing more than 75 years of protections for private sector unions in the Wolverine State in a matter of hours -- and in disregard of the state's culture of private sector unionization and the lack of public support for this action -- is likely to have many adverse consequences, some intended and some unintended. Just ask Romney's Ohio allies who saw first-hand the public backlash against political machinations to make it harder for Americans there to vote.

Still, there is no doubt that if Governor Snyder signs the RTW bill, Michigan workers will be hurt and unions in the state will be hurting, in the near term.

RTW in Michigan this holiday season -- it's a bill only Ebenezer Scrooge, or his modern day equivalent, could love.

How Dark Money Helped Republicans Hold the House and Hurt Voters

Original Link: http://www.propublica.org/article/how-dark-money-helped-republicans-hold-the-house-and-hurt-voters

By Olga Pierce, Justin Elliott and Theodoric Meyer

In the November election, a million more Americans voted for Democrats seeking election to the U.S. House of Representatives than Republicans. But that popular vote advantage did not result in control of the chamber. Instead, despite getting fewer votes, Republicans have maintained a commanding control of the House. Such a disparity has happened only three times in the last century.
(Here’s a chart comparing 2010 and 2012.)

Analysts and others have identified redistricting as a key to the disparity. Republicans had a years-long strategy of winning state houses in order to control each state's once-a-decade redistricting process. (Confused about redistricting? Check out our song.)

Republican strategist Karl Rove laid out the approach in a Wall Street Journal column in early 2010 headlined "He who controls redistricting can control Congress."

The approach paid off. In 2010 state races, Republicans picked up 675 legislative seats, gaining complete control of 12 state legislatures. As a result, the GOP oversaw redrawing of lines for four times as many congressional districts as Democrats.

How did they dominate redistricting? A ProPublica investigation has found that the GOP relied on opaque nonprofits funded by dark money, supposedly nonpartisan campaign outfits, and millions in corporate donations to achieve Republican-friendly maps throughout the country. Two tobacco giants, Altria and Reynolds, each pitched in more than $1 million to the main Republican redistricting group, as did Rove's super PAC, American Crossroads; Walmart and the pharmaceutical industry also contributed. Other donors, who gave to the nonprofits Republicans created, may never have to be disclosed.

While many observers have noted that mega-donors like Sheldon Adelson backed losing candidates, a close look at the Republicans' effort on redistricting suggests something else: The hundreds of millions spent this year on presidential TV ads may not have hit the mark, but the relatively modest sums funneled to redistricting paid off handsomely.

Where Democrats were in control, they drew gerrymandered maps just like Republicans. They also had their own secretive redistricting funding. (Last year, we detailed how Democrats in California worked to undermine the state's attempt at non-partisan redistricting.) But Democrats got outspent 3-to-1 and did not prioritize winning state legislatures. They also faced a Republican surge in 2010.

Exactly how the Republican effort worked has been shrouded in mystery until now. But depositions and other documents in a little-noticed lawsuit in North Carolina offer an exceptionally detailed picture of Republicans' tactics.

Documents show that national Republican operatives, funded by dark money groups, drew the crucial lines which packed as many Democrats as possible into three congressional districts. The result: the state's congressional delegation flipped from 7-6 Democratic to 9-4 in favor of Republicans. The combination of party operatives, cash and secrecy also existed in other states, including Wisconsin, Ohio and Michigan.

Redistricting is supposed to protect the fundamental principle of one-person-one-vote. As demographics change, lines are shifted to make sure everyone is equally represented and to give communities a voice. In order for Republicans to win in North Carolina, they undermined the votes of Democrats, especially African-Americans. (Party leaders in North Carolina say they were simply complying with federal voting laws.)
The strategy began in the run-up to the 2010 elections. Republicans poured money into local races in North Carolina and elsewhere. It was an efficient approach. While congressional races routinely cost millions, a few thousand dollars can swing a campaign for a seat in the state legislature

The Republican effort to influence redistricting overall was spearheaded by a group called the Republican State Leadership Committee, which has existed since 2002. For most of that time, it was primarily a vehicle for donors like health care and tobacco companies to influence state legislatures, key battlegrounds for regulations that affect corporate America. Its focus changed in 2010 when Ed Gillespie, former counselor to President George W. Bush, was named chairman. His main project: redistricting.

Soon after Gillespie took over, the RSLC announced an effort to influence state races throughout the country, the Redistricting Majority Project, or REDMAP. Fundraising soared. The group raised $30 million in 2010, by far its best year. (Its Democratic counterpart raised roughly $10 million.)

The RSLC is organized as a type of political group that can take in unlimited corporate donations. It must disclose its contributors. But that doesn't mean it's always possible to trace the origins of the money.
Along with Walmart and tobacco companies, the RSLC's largest funders in 2010 were the Chamber of Commerce and American Justice Partnership, which gave a combined $6.5 million. Those two groups raise money from corporations and others but don't have to disclose their donors.

As the 2010 North Carolina legislative elections heated up, the RSLC jumped into local races. But the way they made contributions kept their involvement away from the attention of state voters. Rather than running campaign ads under its own name, the RSLC distributed money to a newly formed local nonprofit. The RSLC declined to comment.

The RSLC gave $1.25 million to its vehicle of choice Real Jobs NC. The group calls itself a "non-partisan organization that believes we need to return to a reliance on the free enterprise system that made our country great for real answers." It was started in 2010 and got a hefty $200,000 boost from dollar store magnate and Republican supporter Art Pope, although Pope denies his donation was related to redistricting or REDMAP.

Real Jobs NC produced ads and mailers slamming more than 20 state Democrats.
"Steve Goss … nice guy," intoned the voiceover in one such ad in North Carolina, attacking then-Democratic State Senator Goss. "Too bad he's voting with the Raleigh liberals over hometown conservatives."

Goss lost, and Democrats lost control of North Carolina's General Assembly for the first time in a century. The pattern repeated itself across the country.

"Twenty legislative bodies which were previously split or under Democratic control are now under Republican control," said a triumphant RSLC REDMAP post-election analysis, highlighting its spending in Wisconsin, Ohio, Pennsylvania and North Carolina, among other states.

The next step for Republicans was to draw district maps, which can be expensive. The maps require expertise, extensive data and sophisticated software. Skillful map drawers can make even the most partisan gerrymander look reasonable.

To fund the work, the Republican State Leadership Committee used its previously dormant nonprofit arm, the State Government Leadership Foundation. Such dark money groups are increasingly popular because they are allowed to keep secret the identity of their donors. Federal tax law permits them to do this as long as they pledge that politics is not their primary focus.

Flush with anonymous donors' cash, the Foundation paid $166,000 to hire the GOP's pre-eminent redistricting experts, according to tax documents. The team leader was Tom Hofeller, architect of Republican-friendly maps going back decades.

"Our team would be happy to assist in drawing proposed maps, interpreting data, or providing advice," wrote Chris Jankowski, the head of both the RSLC and State Government Leadership Foundation, in a   of introduction to North Carolina legislators. The letter was disclosed as part of the North Carolina lawsuit.
"We are engaged in a number of states and believe we are playing a meaningful role in helping draw fair and legal lines that will allow us to run competitive elections in 2012 and in future cycles," Jankowski added.
The same letter emphasized that the Republican redistricting push was being funded through its dark money nonprofit: "The entirety of this effort will be paid for using non-federal dollars through our 501c(4) organization."

Jankowski, representing both the RSLC and the Foundation, declined to comment.

Because Hofeller's team was paid with dark money and the redistricting process is so secretive, it is hard to know the full extent of its activities. In Wisconsin, the team provided technical assistance to an aide to Rep. Paul Ryan as he drew new districts that favored Republicans. In Missouri, Hofeller was the sole witness called by attorneys representing the Republican legislators who drew the maps there.

In the case of North Carolina, Hofeller made his first trip to Raleigh on Feb. 1, 2011, even before final state Census data had been released, the first of 10 trips that year.

From then on, two parallel redistricting processes unfolded in the state.

Through the spring and summer, legislators in charge of redistricting traveled the state holding public meetings at local colleges, soliciting comment and proposed maps from citizens — though the Republicans on the committee would not produce draft maps themselves.

"We are not here to answer questions. We are not here drawing maps," state Senate redistricting committee chairman Bob Rucho told the crowd at a hearing in Durham. "What we are here for is to basically hear your thoughts and dreams about redistricting."

But that input had little influence on the districts that were eventually drawn.

Instead, the real maps were being produced behind the scenes by a team that based its operations at Republican Party headquarters on Hillsborough Street in Raleigh. Armed with advanced mapping software, Hofeller and others crafted districts that would virtually guarantee big gains for the party.
Hofeller did not attend or read transcripts of any of the public meetings, according to his deposition. Hofeller did not respond to requests for comment.

A mysterious state dark money nonprofit that sprung up just in time for the process, called Fair and Legal Redistricting for North Carolina, hired a technician to operate the mapping workstation day-to-day, and another Republican mapping expert. The group did not respond to our requests for comment.

State-based nonprofits have been a vehicle for Republicans to funnel anonymous money into their map-drawing operations in a number of states, including self-proclaimed nonpartisan groups in Michigan and Minnesota.

Republican state legislators tasked with redistricting frequently visited and consulted with the mapping team, according to depositions. Even Art Pope, the most influential conservative donor in the state, was appointed "co-counsel" to the legislative leadership and allowed in the room to give direct instructions to the technician.
"We worked together at the workstation," said Joel Raupe, the technical expert paid by Fair and Legal Redistricting, in a deposition. "He sat next to me."

Pope, who is a lawyer but does not actively practice, was made co-counsel to the state legislature, offering his services pro bono. Now, because he was technically a legal adviser to the state, he says any information about his involvement in the redistricting is privileged.

(The New Yorker had a sweeping profile of Pope last year, detailing how he has used his fortune to dominate North Carolina politics.)

North Carolina's Republican incumbents in Congress pushed for a so-called "10-3 map," the majority they hoped to win in the state's delegation.

Hofeller, the mapping expert, delivered. His maps kept most of the districts from being competitive — or even remotely winnable — for Democratic candidates.

A key part of the redistricting strategy was to push minority voters into three districts. Republicans insisted their maps were "fair and legal," necessary to conform to laws protecting minority voting rights, although according to a well-known voting rights attorney, the opposite is true.

But federal voting rights law "doesn't require a jurisdiction to pack blacks in districts," said Laughlin McDonald, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Voting Rights Project. "If you tried to pack minority voters into a district, that would arguably be a violation."

In two of those districts, African-American incumbents been already been winning by large margins for years. Republicans' maps added yet more African-Americans to the districts, what's known in redistricting parlance as "packing." As Hofeller wrote in an email about one of the districts, the plan was to "incorporate all the significant concentrations of minority voters in the northeast into the first district."

A third district was 120-mile long, and sea monkey-shaped, connecting pockets of African-Americans from three different, distant cities. Republicans justified it on the basis of a common media market.

The maps were designed to "segregate African-American voters in three districts and concede those districts to the Democrats," says Bob Hall of Democracy North Carolina, a nonpartisan public interest group that joined the lawsuit against the new maps.

In 2012, Democrats won the three districts by more than 70 percent of the vote. Another effect: the surrounding districts were much more Republican.

Rucho and other Republican legislators had presented the maps as advantageous to Democrats. Indeed, registered Democrats actually outnumbered registered Republicans in seven additional districts beyond those that were clearly slated to be Democratic.

Emails show Republicans decided to make that fact a major talking point.

But the stat was misleading, as the Republicans' own data indicates. An internal analysis of one of Hofeller's later drafts (code name "Blue Horizon 3") obtained by ProPublica shows that those seven allegedly "competitive" districts would have been landslide wins for John McCain in 2008, and for Republican Senator Richard Burr in 2010.

The carefully drawn maps worked. In this year's elections, Democratic candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives in North Carolina won 50.6 percent of the total vote. But the state's House delegation now has nine Republicans and just four Democrats. One of the Democrats won by just a few hundred voters, despite the fact that his newly drawn district skewed heavily Republican and that his own home had been drawn out of it. North Carolina's delegation before the election had seven Democrats and six Republicans
In addition to his pay from national Republican groups, invoices show Hofeller billed North Carolina taxpayers $77,000 for his services.

The Republican maps are still under threat by suits filed by Democrats and the NAACP. The lawsuits are headed to the state Supreme Court. But a flood of contributions tied to the RSLC have lowered the risk of the maps' being overturned.

While judicial elections in North Carolina are nominally nonpartisan, it was common knowledge that Republicans held a 4-3 majority on the court. One of those Republican incumbents was facing a tough challenge in 2012, potentially throwing the whole redistricting result in jeopardy.

Justice Paul Newby was running for re-election against appellate judge Sam Ervin IV, grandson of the famous North Carolina senator who investigated Watergate. With a few weeks left until the November election, Newby was trailing Ervin.

But then, in the final stretch, Newby was the beneficiary of a flood of late spending that can be traced back to the Republican State Leadership Committee.

Once again the contributions were funneled through homegrown groups. With only a few weeks to go, the RSLC gave more than $1.1 million to a group called Justice for All NC. Campaign finance filings show Justice for All NC in turn gave nearly $1.5 million to a super PAC running pro-Newby ads, the NC Judicial Coalition.

Most of the money spent by the super PAC went to pay for hundreds of airings of a jingle ad featuring lines like, "Paul Newby / Justice tough but fair / Paul Newby / Criminals best beware" set to infectious banjo music.

The spending didn't end there: and Pope's fingerprints were also on the race. Two dark money groups affiliated with Pope — the state-based Civitas Action and Americans for Prosperity — spent another $300,000 on radio ads and mailers supporting Newby. Pope's company also gave to the RSLC in the run-up to this fall's elections.

Pope says he gave money to Americans for Prosperity for years before the judicial race even came up, and that he was not involved in the decision to run pro-Newby ads.

"I'm Republican, I support Republican groups," Pope said. "But just because you support something doesn't mean you're responsible for all they do."

It was an unusually large amount of outside spending for a judicial race. The outside pro-Newby groups had spent more on the race than the two campaigns combined.

In the end, Newby eked out a 52-48 victory, preserving the court's Republican majority.
When the groups contesting the maps called for Newby to recuse himself from redistricting litigation, lawyers for Republican legislators argued that because the campaign ads were paid for by "independent" groups, they did not jeopardize Newby's impartiality.

On Monday, the state Supreme Court rejected the motion for Newby to recuse himself.
"I've got no control over who contributes to an ad. I have no control over who endorses me," Newby — who did not respond to a request for comment — told a local TV station on the eve of the election. "You've got to put your blinders on like lady justice."

Saturday, December 22, 2012

Why the US media ignored Murdoch's brazen bid to hijack the presidency

Original Link: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/20/bernstein-murdoch-ailes-petreaus-presidency

By

So now we have it: what appears to be hard, irrefutable evidence of Rupert Murdoch's ultimate and most audacious attempt – thwarted, thankfully, by circumstance – to hijack America's democratic institutions on a scale equal to his success in kidnapping and corrupting the essential democratic institutions of Great Britain through money, influence and wholesale abuse of the privileges of a free press.

In the American instance, Murdoch's goal seems to have been nothing less than using his media empire – notably Fox News – to stealthily recruit, bankroll and support the presidential candidacy of General David Petraeus in the 2012 election.

Thus in the spring of 2011 – less than 10 weeks before Murdoch's centrality to the hacking and politician-buying scandal enveloping his British newspapers was definitively revealed – Fox News' inventor and president, Roger Ailes, dispatched an emissary to Afghanistan to urge Petraeus to turn down President Obama's expected offer to become CIA director and, instead, run for the Republican nomination for president, with promises of being bankrolled by Murdoch. Ailes himself would resign as president of Fox News and run the campaign, according to the conversation between Petraeus and the emissary, K T McFarland, a Fox News on-air defense "analyst" and former spear carrier for national security principals in three Republican administrations.

All this was revealed in a tape recording of Petraeus's meeting with McFarland obtained by Bob Woodward, whose account of their discussion, accompanied online by audio of the tape, was published in the Washington Post – distressingly, in its style section, and not on page one, where it belonged – and, under the style logo, online on December 3.

Indeed, almost as dismaying as Ailes' and Murdoch's disdain for an independent and truly free and honest press, and as remarkable as the obsequious eagerness of their messenger to convey their extraordinary presidential draft and promise of on-air Fox support to Petraeus, has been the ho-hum response to the story by the American press and the country's political establishment, whether out of fear of Murdoch, Ailes and Fox – or, perhaps, lack of surprise at Murdoch's, Ailes' and Fox's contempt for decent journalistic values or a transparent electoral process.

The tone of the media's reaction was set from the beginning by the Post's own tin-eared treatment of this huge story: relegating it, like any other juicy tidbit of inside-the-beltway media gossip, to the section of the newspaper and its website that focuses on entertainment, gossip, cultural and personality-driven news, instead of the front page.

"Bob had a great scoop, a buzzy media story that made it perfect for Style. It didn't have the broader import that would justify A1," Liz Spayd, the Post's managing editor, told Politico when asked why the story appeared in the style section.

Buzzy media story? Lacking the "broader import" of a front-page story? One cannot imagine such a failure of news judgment among any of Spayd's modern predecessors as managing editors of the Post, especially in the clear light of the next day and with a tape recording – of the highest audio quality – in hand.
 
"Tell [Ailes] if I ever ran," Petraeus announces on the crystal-clear digital recording and then laughs, "but I won't … but if I ever ran, I'd take him up on his offer. … He said he would quit Fox … and bankroll it."

McFarland clarified the terms: "The big boss is bankrolling it. Roger's going to run it. And the rest of us are going to be your in-house" – thereby confirming what Fox New critics have consistently maintained about the network's faux-news agenda and its built-in ideological bias.

And here let us posit the following: were an emissary of the president of NBC News, or of the editor of the New York Times or the Washington Post ever caught on tape promising what Ailes and Murdoch had apparently suggested and offered here, the hue and cry, especially from Fox News and Republican/Tea Party America, from the Congress to the US Chamber of Commerce to the Heritage Foundation, would be deafening and not be subdued until there was a congressional investigation, and the resignations were in hand of the editor and publisher of the network or newspaper. Or until there had been plausible and convincing evidence that the most important elements of the story were false. And, of course, the story would continue day after day on page one and remain near the top of the evening news for weeks, until every ounce of (justifiable) piety about freedom of the press and unfettered presidential elections had been exhausted.

The tape of Petraeus and McFarland's conversation is an amazing document, a testament to the willingness of Murdoch and the wily genius he hired to create Fox News to run roughshod over the American civic and political landscape without regard to even the traditional niceties or pretenses of journalistic independence and honesty. Like the revelations of the hacking scandal, which established beyond any doubt Murdoch's ability to capture and corrupt the three essential elements of the British civic compact – the press, politicians and police – the Ailes/Petraeus tape makes clear that Murdoch's goals in America have always been just as ambitious, insidious and nefarious.

The digital recording, and the dead-serious conspiratorial conversation it captures so chillingly in tone and substance ("I'm only reporting this back to Roger. And that's our deal," McFarland assured Petraeus as she unfolded the offer) utterly refutes Ailes' disingenuous dismissal of what he and Murdoch were actually attempting: the buying of the presidency.
 
"It was more of a joke, a wiseass way I have," Ailes would later claim while nonetheless confirming its meaning. "I thought the Republican field [in the primaries] needed to be shaken up and Petraeus might be a good candidate."
 
The recording deserves to be heard by any open-minded person trying to fathom its meaning to the fullest.

Murdoch and Ailes have erected an incredibly influential media empire that has unrivaled power in British and American culture: rather than judiciously exercising that power or improving reportorial and journalistic standards with their huge resources, they have, more often than not, recklessly pursued an agenda of sensationalism, manufactured controversy, ideological messianism, and political influence-buying while masquerading as exemplars of a free and responsible press. The tape is powerful evidence of their methodology and reach.

The Murdoch story – his corruption of essential democratic institutions on both sides of the Atlantic – is one of the most important and far-reaching political/cultural stories of the past 30 years, an ongoing tale without equal. Like Richard Nixon and his tapes, much attention has been focused on the necessity of finding the smoking gun to confirm what other evidence had already established beyond a doubt: that the elemental instruments of democracy, ie the presidency in Nixon's case, and the privileges of free press in Murdoch's, were grievously misused and abused for their own ends by those entrusted to use great power for the common good.
      
In Nixon's case, the system worked. His actions were investigated by Congress, the judicial system held that even the president of the United States was not above the law, and he was forced to resign or face certain impeachment and conviction. American and British democracy has not been so fortunate with Murdoch, whose power and corruption went unchecked for a third of a century.

The most important thing we journalists do is make judgments about what is news. Perhaps no story has eluded us on a daily basis (for lack of trying) for so many years as the story of Murdoch's destructive march across our democratic landscape. Only the Guardian vigorously pursued the leads of the hacking story and methodically stuck with it for months and years, never ignoring the underlying context of how Rupert Murdoch conducted his take-no-prisoners business and journalism without regard for the most elemental standards of fairness, accuracy or balance, or even lawful conduct.

When the Guardian's hacking coverage reached critical mass last year, I quoted a former top Murdoch deputy as follows: "This scandal and all its implications could not have happened anywhere else. Only in Murdoch's orbit. The hacking at News of the World was done on an industrial scale. More than anyone, Murdoch invented and established this culture in the newsroom, where you do whatever it takes to get the story, take no prisoners, destroy the competition, and the end will justify the means."

The tape that Bob Woodward obtained, and which the Washington Post ran in the style section, should be the denouement of the Murdoch story on both sides of the Atlantic, making clear that no institution, not even the presidency of the United States, was beyond the object of his subversion. If Murdoch had bankrolled a successful Petraeus presidential campaign and – as his emissary McFarland promised – "the rest of us [at Fox] are going to be your in-house" – Murdoch arguably might have sewn up the institutions of American democracy even more securely than his British tailoring.

Happily, Petraeus was not hungering for the presidency at the moment of the messenger's arrival: the general was contented at the idea of being CIA director, which Ailes was urging him to forgo.
"We're all set," said the emissary, referring to Ailes, Murdoch and Fox. "It's never going to happen," Petraeus said. "You know it's never going to happen. It really isn't. … My wife would divorce me."

Thursday, December 13, 2012

ALEC-Inspired Union-Busting Bill Narrowly Passes in Michigan as Koch Group Cheers

Original Link: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/12/11899/alec-inspired-union-busting-bill-narrowly-passes-michigan-koch-group-cheers

By Mary Bottari

Today in Michigan, Gov. Rick Snyder and his GOP controlled lame-duck legislature pulled a fast one, introducing and then ramming through the House and the Senate so-called "right to work" legislation. The bill was introduced at 11 a.m., passed the House at 5 p.m. by a narrow margin and the Senate at around 6:00 p.m. When the process is complete and the bill is signed, Michigan will become the 24th right to work state.

Why the rush? The GOP majority felt it might not have the votes once the newly elected legislature was seated in January. The bill is designed so it cannot be repealed by popular referendum.
The Capitol was chaotic today as police peppersprayed protesters and locked down the building, forcing Democrats to seek a court order to get the doors open again. "It's not only anti-worker, its anti-democratic," Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero told MSNBC.

Right to work bills prohibit unions from requiring all members to pay dues. The laws make it much harder for unions to organize and exist. They have long been used in the South to push down wages and weaken worker movements. The Michigan bill will apply to both public and private sector unions.

At a time when working families are struggling, the Michigan GOP decided it was a fine time to push for a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions, while at the same time kneecapping their chief opponents in the political arena -- organized workers.

Koch Brothers Kick Up Their Heels

Standing tall behind the measure was David Koch's Americans for Prosperity group, the non-profit organization that bankrolled Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's efforts to strip the state's public employee unions of their collective bargaining rights. AFP ran a multi-million dollar ad campaign trying to convince Wisconsinites that unions were their enemy, sponsoring rallies and backing Walker to the hilt when he later faced recall over the measure.

The crowing began early this morning. "Michigan passage of right-to-work legislation will be the shot heard around the world for workplace freedom. A victory over forced unionization in a union stronghold like Michigan would be an unprecedented win on par with Wisconsin that would pave the way for right to work in states across our nation," said Scott Hagerstrom, Michigan director of AFP in a statement.

AFP and other Koch-funded groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) have long promoted an extreme anti-worker agenda. It comes as no surprise that key sponsors of the Michigan bill in the House and the Senate such as Senator Arlan Meekhoff, Rep. Tom McMillin, and Rep. Pete Lund are ALEC members. Michigan legislators talked about their plans for passing Right to Work at the ALEC Spring Task Force Meeting in Charlotte earlier this year according to a legislator from New Hampshire.

The ALEC library of bills CMD first posted on ALECexposed.org not only includes a "model" "Right to Work" bill and other measures to disempower and defund unions, but a raft of measures to crush wages for the benefit of corporate CEOs. ALEC has bills to repeal living wage laws, prevailing wage laws, and even minimum wage laws. The only workers ALEC wants to help are workers in China; ALEC has never seen a job killing free trade bill that it has not backed.

Workplace Fairness or a Race to the Bottom?

Michigan's Republican Governor Rick Snyder has vowed to sign the bill into law and said today, "This is about workplace fairness and equality. This is about the relationship between workers and their union. Workers should have a right to choose who they associate with." His goal was to "bring people together," not divide Michigan.

This is a change in tune for the Governor who previously said that the legislation was not a "policy priority" because it was "too divisive."

The move was political payback for the unions that had attempted to protect themselves from such an assault by changing the Constitution in an unsuccessful ballot measure this past fall. "The union bosses overreached in Michigan when they tried to strong arm their way into our Constitution, and we are proud to stand with the elected officials who are going to strike a blow for workplace freedom," said AFP's Hagerstrom. AFP opposed Prop 2 and other pro-union measures on the ballot.
But "workplace freedom" does not translate into higher wages.

"Laws like this bring lower wages, slashed benefits, disappearing pensions and unsafe workplaces. They silence the voices of people who work for a living. Calling this bill 'Right-To-Work' is a lie. The only rights it will provide are the rights of millionaires and billionaires to do whatever they want to working people. This is wrong for Michigan and wrong for hard-working people across the United States," said United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard.

"If what we want to do is do a little bit better at attracting certain kinds of low-wage jobs, I think this may help," Michigan economist Charles Ballard said. "But it's an awful lot of political blood to be spilled for something that will not galvanize Michigan's economy."

Scott Walker Still Has a Koch Habit

Original Link: http://www.progressive.org/scott-walker-still-has-koch-habit

By Elizabeth DiNovella

Now that the shellacking of Mitt Romney is over, conservatives are ready to move on to the next Presidential election in 2016. GOP hopefuls have been wasting no time in meeting with the billionaires who dumped scads of money into this year’s race.

Politico reports that a week after Election Day, three Republican governors who want to be Prez—Bobby Jindal, John Kasich, and Bob McDonnell—paid individual visits to super PAC sugar daddy Sheldon Adelson in Las Vegas, hoping to be the casino mogul’s next Newt Gingrich.
Vegas was hosting the Republican Governors Association at the time, so it was easy to stop by and say hello.

The more ambitious GOP guvs arrived in Vegas before the Republican Governors Association conference started in order to attend to the association’s high-roller Executive Roundtable, a program for the GOP donors with deep pockets and deep connections.

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker, a favorite of wealthy conservatives for going after collective bargaining, made his way to the Republican Governors Association’s Executive Roundtable. (He was also elected to the RGA executive committee.)

Walker is “not going to win a beauty contest, probably, but he’s a down-to-earth real person who is able to communicate solutions to people,” said Hubbard who wrote big checks to the super PAC backing Romney, the Koch brothers-backed Americans for Prosperity, and Karl Rove’s Crossroads outfit. “And the one thing that Mr. Romney wasn’t was a communicator. He couldn’t communicate with anybody.”

Hubbard, a Minnesota television station owner who has attended Koch donor summits for years, went on to say he would raise money for a Walker Presidential campaign and would consider donating to a pro-Walker super PAC.

On Tuesday, Walker will be among the group of governors who will meet with President Obama at the White House to discuss the so-called fiscal cliff. Will a White House visit only whet Walker’s appetite for a Presidential bid? Time will tell.
If you liked this story by Elizabeth DiNovella, the Culture Editor of The Progressive magazine, check out her story "Scott Walker’s Wisconsin Starting to Seem Like Illinois."

Koch Brothers Behind Michigan Right to Work Legislation

Original Link: http://unionosity.com/news/koch-brothers-behind-michigan-right-to-work-legislation/

By Kenneth Quinnell

Michigan is poised to become the latest state to pass “right to work” for less legislation, a mislabeled policy that is designed to weaken the rights and wages of working families. As is often the case in recent years, extreme anti-worker legislation, like the law in Michigan, can be traced back to Americans for Prosperity (AFP) and the group’s founders Charles and David Koch, the billionaire brothers who fund a host of extreme right-wing organizations.

The Koch Brothers’ fingerprints are all over “right to work” in Michigan. AFP’s Foundation produced a 15-page booklet: Unions: The Good, the Bad and the Ugly: How Forced Unionization Has Harmed Workers and Michigan. The group recruited hundreds of protesters to counter working family-led rallies at the Capitol and promoted counter-protests on its website.

Another significant in-state supporter of the “right to work” push is the Mackinac Center for Public Policy, whichchampions “right to work” for Michigan frequently on its website. Mackinac has received nearly $70,000 from the Koch Brothers.

While there don’t appear to be any direct contributions from the Koch Brothers to Gov. Rick Snyder (R), there is a significant chance that Koch money helped him get elected. In 2010, when Snyder was elected, the Koch Brothers gave more than $1 million to the Republican Governors Association, which gave a direct contribution to Snyder and gave more than $5 million to the Michigan Republican Party, whose top priority in 2010 had to be Snyder. The party gave Snyder a direction contribution as well.

Americans for Prosperity doesn’t even try to hide its agenda, which is to weaken workers’ rights:
Michigan passage of “right to work” legislation will be the shot heard around the world for workplace freedom. A victory over forced unionization in a union stronghold like Michigan would be an unprecedented win on par with Wisconsin that would pave the way for “right to work” in states across our nation.

It’s hard to know how much influence the Koch Brothers had on Snyder and Republicans in the legislature, but it is notable that Snyder was on record repeatedly denying he would pursue ”right to work” until this week, when he abruptly changed course. Earlier this year, Snyder said “right to work” was a “very divisiveissue.” Another significant influence is the DeVos family, owners of the Amway empire, and contributors to Snyder and any number of other right-wing causes.

The trail of funding behind “right to work” isn’t the only shadowy part of the story, as the tactics used to push the legislation through are about as undemocratic and dishonest as is possible. Nearly every claim Snyder and his allies has made about “right to work” laws is demonstrably false.

 Legislative leaders rammed the bill through with no public input, no committee hearings, no floor debate and no real time for the public to review the proposed law. They also attached an appropriation to the bill, which means that, under Michigan law, the public cannot reverse the action through referendum.

Right-wingers Koch, ALEC, pushed Michigan ‘right-to-work’ laws

Original Link: http://tv.msnbc.com/2012/12/12/koch-alec-pushed-michigan-right-to-work-laws/

By

The United Auto Workers were “blindsided” by Michigan’s new ‘right-to-work’ legislation, union president Bob King told MSNBC Tuesday, shortly after Gov. Rick Snyder signed the bills into law. In fact, the union had entered what King described as amicable talks with Snyder only days before, and the governor—who had previously opposed right-to-work—offered no indication that his views had changed.

“We had made a lot of progress, which he and the staff, everybody, felt good about,” said King. “But then all of a sudden, he flipped on us, and we heard that he was going to sign this bill.”

Snyder’s public position on right-to-work turned into a ringing endorsement, seemingly overnight. Suddenly, he was championing right-to-work as “Freedom to Work,” calling it “pro-worker,” and saying it would create “more and better jobs in Michigan.”

To explain the shift, Snyder has said that the issue simply gained “critical mass.” But lately, a well-funded conservative political machine, with ties to the Koch family and other wealthy backers, as well as to the notorious conservative lobby group ALEC, has been flexing its considerable muscle. What looked like a spontaneous shift in Michigan labor policy had been planned for months—and the success of the right-to-work push could foretell future efforts nationwide.

Rep. Tom Shirkey, a Republican, described the passage of right-to-work to MSNBC as a “big team effort.”

“There’s a long list of very public special interest groups and associations that have been advocating for labor freedom for a long time,” Shirkey said in an interview Wednesday. “There’s also a long list of people who would just as soon stay behind the scenes who have been very supportive. And I’m just privileged to be one small piece in this very big puzzle.”

One key piece in the puzzle: The Mackinac Public Policy Center, a Michigan-based non-profit that has been publishing reports about the benefits of right-to-work legislation for more than two decades. The organization is well-connected; its president, Joseph G. Lehman, is a former VP of communications at the Cato Institute in Washington, D.C. And its director of labor policy, F. Vincent Vernuccio—a former Bush administration official—has been lauded by Fox News’ Stuart Varney as a “top union watchdog.”

Mackinac’s influence is local, but its network is nationwide. The think tank is a member of the State Policy Network, which Mackinac spokesperson Ted O’Neil told MSNBC was something of a “sister think tank.” Mother Jones’ Andy Kroll, who has reported extensively on SPN’s activities, has written that it’s behind “one of the largest assaults on American unions in recent history.”

Because of its tax status, Mackinac can’t lobby, but makes its influence felt in other ways.
“What my reporting turned up was other kinds of pressure,” Kroll said on The Ed Show in April 2011. “It comes in policy briefings; some think tanks can lobby lawmakers. So it’s not quite campaign contributions, but it’s similar.”

According to a report in The Nation, Mackinac spent more than $3 million on its public advocacy budget in 2008, 2009 and 2010. In 2011, its spending shot up to $5.7 million.

Mackinac also has ties to another, more notorious conservative network with national influence: the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), the group most famous for pushing the “papers, please” bill in Arizona. Earlier this year, at the ALEC Task Force Summit in Charlotte, North Carolina, Mackinac put three pieces of “model legislation” before ALEC’s Commerce, Insurance, and Economic Development Task Force. One of those bills was already Michigan state law—all three were anti-union.

Now, model legislation from ALEC’s countrywide network may have found its way back into Michigan. Based on a side-by-side analysis from the Center for Media and Democracy, Salon reported on Tuesday that Michigan’s new right-to-work legislation “appears to pull language directly from ALEC’s model right-to-work bill.”

Mackinac also accomplished another major coup in 2011, when Snyder signed what one supporter called a “financial martial law” bill allowing “emergency financial managers” extensive power to privatize and union-bust. (The Rachel Maddow Show has reported extensively on the the anti-democratic power grab that the law enabled in the town of Benton Harbor.) Kroll wrote that the Mackinac Center had spent years “pushing for the most controversial provisions in Snyder’s bill.”

Who funds Mackinac? In tax records obtained by Kroll, two big names stand out: the Charles G.
Koch Foundation and the Dick and Betsy DeVos Foundation. Charles G. Koch is, of course, one half of the influential Koch Brothers. And it’s no surprise that the Koch-backed Americans for Prosperity (AFP) had a major presence rallying support for the bills in Lansing this week.

But among Michigan power brokers, DeVos might well be the bigger name. Dick DeVos is the son of Richard DeVos, the founder of Amway. In 2006, after achieving success in the corporate world, DeVos the younger ran for governor of Michigan as a Republican. He lost—by a rather decisive 14%—to Democrat Jennifer Granholm.

Since then, he’s worked to exert influence from the outside. Michigan Senate Minority Leader Gretchen Whitmer, a Democrat told MSNBC that some of her Republican colleagues complained to her privately that DeVos was twisting their arms over the anti-union legislation.

“I spoke with someone in Republican leadership who was angry because these heavy-handed tactics were being used with the members,” she said. Republicans told her, she said, that DeVos had “threatened primaries, threatened to spend whatever it takes to beat them if they don’t support these bills.”

Whitmer also cited the involvement of real estate mogul Ron Weiser, the former chair of Michigan’s Republican Party and George W. Bush’s ambassador to Slovakia. Salon’s Josh Eidelson dug up video from 2007 in which Weiser describes working on passing right-to-work in Michigan “full-time.” His comrades in the fight, he says in the footage, include the Michigan wing of AFP—and, of course, none other than Dick DeVos.

Shirkey, the GOP legislator, confirmed to MSNBC that he had spoken with Weiser about the effort.
“I had a number of conversations with Ron Weiser,” said Shirkey. “Ron, I consider a good friend. He’s a strong advocate for labor freedom, and frankly, he started a pretty significant process a couple years ago on this.” Shirkey said he had not spoken with DeVos.

Both AFP and Mackinac deny any meaningful role in getting right-to-work passed. AFP’s Michigan state director Scott Hagerstrom described himself as “surprised but very pleased” to see the legislation come up.

“Right-to-work has been around for a long time,” said O’Neil. “We certainly didn’t invent it, but certainly we’re glad to see good public policy move forward.”

ALEC-Inspired Union-Busting Bill Narrowly Passes in Michigan as Koch Group Cheers

Original Link: http://www.prwatch.org/news/2012/12/11899/alec-inspired-union-busting-bill-narrowly-passes-michigan-koch-group-cheers

By Mary Bottari

Today in Michigan, Gov. Rick Snyder and his GOP controlled lame-duck legislature pulled a fast one, introducing and then ramming through the House and the Senate so-called "right to work" legislation. The bill was introduced at 11 a.m., passed the House at 5 p.m. by a narrow margin and the Senate at around 6:00 p.m. When the process is complete and the bill is signed, Michigan will become the 24th right to work state.

Why the rush? The GOP majority felt it might not have the votes once the newly elected legislature was seated in January. The bill is designed so it cannot be repealed by popular referendum.
The Capitol was chaotic today as police peppersprayed protesters and locked down the building, forcing Democrats to seek a court order to get the doors open again. "It's not only anti-worker, its anti-democratic," Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero told MSNBC.

Right to work bills prohibit unions from requiring all members to pay dues. The laws make it much harder for unions to organize and exist. They have long been used in the South to push down wages and weaken worker movements. The Michigan bill will apply to both public and private sector unions.

At a time when working families are struggling, the Michigan GOP decided it was a fine time to push for a race to the bottom in wages and working conditions, while at the same time kneecapping their chief opponents in the political arena -- organized workers.

Koch Brothers Kick Up Their Heels

Standing tall behind the measure was David Koch's Americans for Prosperity group, the non-profit organization that bankrolled Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker's efforts to strip the state's public employee unions of their collective bargaining rights. AFP ran a multi-million dollar ad campaign trying to convince Wisconsinites that unions were their enemy, sponsoring rallies and backing Walker to the hilt when he later faced recall over the measure.

The crowing began early this morning. "Michigan passage of right-to-work legislation will be the shot heard around the world for workplace freedom. A victory over forced unionization in a union stronghold like Michigan would be an unprecedented win on par with Wisconsin that would pave the way for right to work in states across our nation," said Scott Hagerstrom, Michigan director of AFP in a statement.

AFP and other Koch-funded groups like the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) have long promoted an extreme anti-worker agenda. It comes as no surprise that key sponsors of the Michigan bill in the House and the Senate such as Senator Arlan Meekhoff, Rep. Tom McMillin, and Rep. Pete Lund are ALEC members. Michigan legislators talked about their plans for passing Right to Work at the ALEC Spring Task Force Meeting in Charlotte earlier this year according to a legislator from New Hampshire.

The ALEC library of bills CMD first posted on ALECexposed.org not only includes a "model" "Right to Work" bill and other measures to disempower and defund unions, but a raft of measures to crush wages for the benefit of corporate CEOs. ALEC has bills to repeal living wage laws, prevailing wage laws, and even minimum wage laws. The only workers ALEC wants to help are workers in China; ALEC has never seen a job killing free trade bill that it has not backed.

Workplace Fairness or a Race to the Bottom?

Michigan's Republican Governor Rick Snyder has vowed to sign the bill into law and said today, "This is about workplace fairness and equality. This is about the relationship between workers and their union. Workers should have a right to choose who they associate with." His goal was to "bring people together," not divide Michigan.

This is a change in tune for the Governor who previously said that the legislation was not a "policy priority" because it was "too divisive."

The move was political payback for the unions that had attempted to protect themselves from such an assault by changing the Constitution in an unsuccessful ballot measure this past fall. "The union bosses overreached in Michigan when they tried to strong arm their way into our Constitution, and we are proud to stand with the elected officials who are going to strike a blow for workplace freedom," said AFP's Hagerstrom. AFP opposed Prop 2 and other pro-union measures on the ballot.
But "workplace freedom" does not translate into higher wages.

"Laws like this bring lower wages, slashed benefits, disappearing pensions and unsafe workplaces. They silence the voices of people who work for a living. Calling this bill 'Right-To-Work' is a lie. The only rights it will provide are the rights of millionaires and billionaires to do whatever they want to working people. This is wrong for Michigan and wrong for hard-working people across the United States," said United Steelworkers President Leo Gerard.

"If what we want to do is do a little bit better at attracting certain kinds of low-wage jobs, I think this may help," Michigan economist Charles Ballard said. "But it's an awful lot of political blood to be spilled for something that will not galvanize Michigan's economy."

America sees the effect of a century of labor unions in Michigan--GM in collapse (overpriced and underperforming cars), skyrocketing crime and murder rates, ghost-town neighborhoods demolished--a state in total free fall. Yeah, labor unions have been such a positive influence! Don't blame the GOP, either, because these actions all began happening in the last 40 years. And how does it make sense that someone who doesn't join a union should be required to pay dues anyway? You accuse the GOP of being Stalinist because they don't support unions, but isn't forcing someone to do something against their will and that may not be in line with their political views is, at its core, totalitarian? In other words, tyrannical--just like Stalin and Hitler.

I am a conscientious buyer and I look for the union label--then I put the item back on the shelf and keep looking for a non-union version, even if I have to resort to foreign-made. I will never willingly or knowingly buy union-made. Never.

What have Unions done for America?

1) 1937: Unions gave us the 40-hour work week. (1 point)
2) Fair Wages And Relative Income Equality (yet folks still aren't making enough to survive--even in Michigan.) (-1/2 point)
3) 1938: The end of child labor. Unions helped, but they didn't do it singlehandedly. (1/3 of a point, since two non-union groups also participated.)
4) 1942: Unions fought for employer-provided health coverage. (1 point)
5) 1993: Medical and family leave act. (1 point)

Total points: 2.83

Wow, what an effective 110 year history unions have had. I think I'll continue to take my chances and keep my money here in the South, where the only people who live in squalor are uneducated or too lazy to find gainful employment (like you can find at any Wal-Mart!)

Long Live Right To Work!